Save Article

Britons Under the Occupation

Germany turned the tiny Channel island into a heavily fortified bulwark against a British invasion.

By

Martin Rubin

Aug. 12, 2016 3:34 p.m. ET

It was a minor incident in a long war. In a raid on the night of Oct. 3, 1942, about a dozen British commandos landed on the tiny Channel Island of Sark, capturing one German soldier and shooting others when they tried to raise an alarm or escape. Operation Basalt, as the raid was called, yielded some military intelligence, but its main purpose was to remind local residents, abandoned by British forces two years before, that they were not forgotten in London.